Friday, 17 November 2006

More power for EU - less for UK?

MPs are concerned that UK sovereignty is under threat if the European Commission's plan to abolish Britain's power of veto on crime policies goes ahead.The European scrutiny committee has asked for a debate on whether member states are to give up their veto on police and judicial matters.The loss of veto could affect the legal principle of a person being innocent until proven guilty.Today judicial policy must be agreed unanimously by all 25 states.The commission wants to replace the current system with one weighted according to countries' size under which no individual state holds a veto.The proposed system would give the European Court of Justice further powers of jurisdiction and give the European Parliament a say on issues such as the definition of what constitutes a crime.If Britain retained its veto, the committee said it could lead to the UK being excluded from future EU negotiations on crime.Committee chairman Michael Connarty said "If it goes ahead then we would see the present certainty about our ability to protect Britain's interests in important justice matters replaced with uncertainty."